Must-Read: An absolutely key issue: why doesn’t the logic of cost-reduction via scale and technology work for finance as a whole? It certainly works for commissions…
Thomas Philippon: Finance vs. Wal-Mart: Why are Financial Services so Expensive?, in Rethinking the Financial Crisis, edited by Alan Blinder, Andrew Lo, and Robert Solow (Russell Sage Foundation, 2012): “Despite its fast computers and credit derivatives…
…the current financial system does not seem better at transferring funds from savers to borrowers than the financial system of 1910. “I would rather see Finance less proud and Industry more content…” –Winston Churchill, 1925